Here's another one for the archives; this time, the user who
didn't tell what they really wanted. You contributed to this thread.
Here's the post that started it:

>Date:         Wed, 14 Dec 2005 13:15:57 -0500
>Reply-To: Vivek Kurup <vkurup@opinionsearch.com>
>Subject:      Reading Numeric Data
>To: SPSSX-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>X-ELNK-AV: 0
>
>I want to read numeric data from an ASCII file, without dropping the
>leading zeros. For ex, 09 shud be read in as 09 and not 9.

So, we responded to that, as we interpreted it --

Two posts: how to use N format to display a number with leading zeroes,
specifying the width explicitly:

>Date:         Wed, 14 Dec 2005 20:16:15 +0100
>From: Georg Maubach <Georg.Maubach@dpwnbc.net>
>Subject:      AW:      Reading Numeric Data
>
>as far as I know you could use the FORMATS command by specifying for
>example
>
>(tested code)
>FORMATS variable (N3) . /* if you have a numeric field which shall
>contain 3 digits */ .
>You can change the leading numbers by adjusting Nx.

>Date:         Wed, 14 Dec 2005 11:21:56 -0800
>From: King Douglas <king_d@swbell.net>
>Subject:      Re: Reading Numeric Data
>To: SPSSX-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>
>   Read your numeric data in a usual.  Set the format to the desired
> number of places as follows:
>
>   FORMATS MyNumVar (N2.0).
>   In the case above, a value of 9 would appear as 09.
>
>   FORMATS MyNumVar (N4.0)
>   In the case above, a value of 17 would appear as 0017

Richard, stressing precision, states that what was originally asked is
impossible, while not investigating carefully what was really wanted:

>Date:         Wed, 14 Dec 2005 14:49:08 -0500
>From: Richard Ristow <wrristow@mindspring.com>
>Subject:      Re: Reading Numeric Data
>To: SPSSX-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>
>At 01:15 PM 12/14/2005, Vivek Kurup wrote:
>
>>I want to read numeric data from an ASCII file, without dropping the
>>leading zeros.
>
>You've had good advice: use the N format to display your values.
>
>Remember, though, that this is about display. You can't "read numeric
>data from an ASCII file, without dropping the leading zeroes," because
>the internal form of numeric values cannot accommodate leading zeroes,
>or any similar concept.


And now, the original poster comes back with what he REALLY wanted:

>Date:         Wed, 14 Dec 2005 15:00:40 -0500
>From: Vivek Kurup <vkurup@opinionsearch.com>
>Subject:      Re: Reading Numeric Data
>To: SPSSX-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>
>I want to write out double-width data to a text file (onto specified
>locations), from a SPSS file which has single-width data. Hence I
>wanted to know if I could reformat the current vars to accommodate the
>leading 0's.

(It's not clear what he means by "double-width" and "single-width". Two
digits vs. one digit?)

So you can zero in on solving it:
>Date:         Wed, 14 Dec 2005 12:48:57 -0800
>Reply-To: King Douglas <king_d@swbell.net>
>Subject:      Re: Reading Numeric Data
>To: SPSSX-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>
>   Ah! Well, then, you have to create a string variable before writing
> to the text file.  Say you have a numeric variable MyNumVar of
> maximam two places.  Before writing out the file, do something like
> this:
>
>     STRING MyStrVar(A2).
>   COMPUTE MyStrVar= LPAD(LTRIM(STRING(MyNumVar,F2),' '),2,'0').
>
>   Then write the computed string variable, which preserves leading
> zeros in the second place:
>
>   WRITE OUTFILE = 'c:\temp\MyStrVar.txt
>     /1 MyStrVar 1-2 (A).

And Richard Oliver of SPSS, Inc. offers a solution using the WRITE
command's facilities:

>Date:         Wed, 14 Dec 2005 15:03:26 -0600
>Reply-To: "Oliver, Richard" <roliver@SPSS.COM>
>Subject:      Re: Reading Numeric Data
>To: SPSSX-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>
>If you're using the WRITE command to write out the data, you can
>include  format specifications in the command:
>[If the values of var1, var2 and var3 are 1,2 and 3,]
>
>write outfile='c:\temp\temp.txt'
>  /var1 (n3) var2 (n3) var3 (n3).
>execute.
>
>In this example, the end result is:
>001002003
>
>If you're just adding zeroes to get the numbers in a fixed position,
>however, this is probably more what you want:
>
>write outfile='c:\temp\temp.txt'
>  /var1 (f3) var2 (f3) var3(f3).
>execute.
>
>which results in:
>   1  2  3


And that PROBABLY solved it. But it would have been a lot quicker if
the poster had been clear in the first place.


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